Run-of-the-Mill Conflict

"Teacher Tom, Arthur is calling us 'finger binger'."

"Are you finger binger?"

"No!"

"Then I guess he's wrong."

Most of the time, the children don't need us to get involved in their every day conflicts.

"Teacher Tom, those guys won't let us in their factory."

"How does that make you feel?"

"Bad."

"Did you tell them it makes you feel bad."

"No."

"If I were you I'd tell them it makes me feel bad when they don't let me in their factory."

Sometimes, of course, they do need us, especially when emotions are running high, but most kids, most of the time, are fully competent. They just might need a different perspective.

"Teacher Tom, she took the hula hoops and we were using them."

"Oh no, what did you say to her?"

"Nothing."

"Maybe she doesn't know you were using them."

I don't want to call it tattling, because that word is full of judgement. I like to think of it as kids taking a moment to talk through their options with me. Children who are new to our school often arrive with the expectation that the adult will simply "fix" the problem through the blunt instrument of force that is ours simply by virtue of being an adult in a space for children. But resolving conflicts is a life skill that can't be learned through other people exercising police power.

"Teacher Tom, Erin hit me!"

"Oh no, we all agreed to not hit each other. What did you do?"

"I came over here to tell you."

"Now I know. What are you going to say to Erin?"

"I'm going to tell her to stop hitting me and that I don't like it!"

"That sounds like a good idea."

Sometimes they want me to come with them, to stand nearby. If I sense they're asking for moral support, then I go with them. If I think they just want to use me as muscle or an implied threat, then I ask them to report back.

"Teacher Tom, none of the kids will give me a turn on the swings."

"And you want a turn."

"Yes."

"Did you tell them you want a turn?"

"Yes, and they still keep swinging."

"Maybe they didn't hear you."

"They heard me. I said it really loud."

"What did you say?"

"I said I'm going to tell you that they were being mean."

"And what did they say about that?"

"They said they weren't being mean."

"Maybe they weren't being mean. Maybe they just aren't finished with their turn. Maybe they think you're being mean."

"I'm not mean!"

"I know, but maybe they think you are."

"I know! I'll say please!"

Most often it's the last I hear of the conflict. Other times they get stuck and need me to mediate, which doesn't mean "solve." Usually, I just listen, occasionally repeating or reframing key points.

"Don't call us finger binger!"

If he doesn't respond, I might say, "They don't want you to call them finger binger."

"I didn't call them finger binger."

If they don't respond, I might say, "He says he didn't call you finger binger."

"He did too."

"They say you did."

"I called them finger inger!"

"He says he called you finger inger, not finger binger."

"Well, we don't like that either."

. . . This can take a long time without anyone having more inherent power than anyone else. Learning to resolve conflicts among peers is, necessarily, an inefficient process. And it goes on throughout life. 

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I've been writing about play-based learning almost every day for the past 14 years. I've recently gone back through the 4000+ blog posts(!) I've written since 2009. Here are my 10 favorite in a nifty free download. Click here to get yours.

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Our Interdependence

We must hang together gentlemen . . . else we shall most assuredly hang separately. ~Benjamin Franklin

Happy Independence Day! And “happy” is the appropriate greeting for the day. The Declaration of Independence was the first historical instance of the word "happiness" appearing in the founding documents of any nation.

Today in 1776, 56 men signed their names to this radical document. As a result they were, without trial, proclaimed traitors by the government and sentenced to death. These were middle class people. John Hancock was the wealthiest among them and he was not even a millionaire by today's standards. The wealthy sided with the king. Most of the signers were working people -- farmers and tradesmen primarily. None of them left behind a family fortune, or a foundation, or any other kind of financial memorial of their lives. Our nation is their legacy.

Their average age was 33 (Thomas Jefferson's age at the time). The youngest was only 20-years-old. The oldest was Benjamin Franklin, who was 83.

As a result of having signed the Declaration of Independence, all 56 of the signers were forced to flee their homes. Twelve returned to find only rubble.

As a result of having signed the Declaration of Independence, 17 of them were wiped out financially by the British government.

As a result of having signed the Declaration of Independence, many of them were captured and tortured, or their families were imprisoned, or their children were taken from them. Nine of them died and 4 of them lost their children.

As I read the Declaration of Independence, as I do each July 4, I find myself in awe of their courage. They were all aware of the likely consequences, but they did what they knew must be done. Two centuries later, I still feel the outrage they must have felt as I read through the specific governmental abuses that lead them to that critical moment.

Even more than our Constitution, the Declaration of Independence is the beginning point for the United States of America. I find it both educational and inspirational to return to the source before heading out for fireworks.

When Franklin was asked what kind of nation they were forming, he answered, "A republic, madam, if you can keep it."

I worry at times that we won't be able to keep it, that, in fact, we've already lost it. I worry that too many of us have declared our independence not from tyrants, but from one another, not understanding that in creating a constitutional government of, by, and for we the people, we were also declaring our interdependence.

At the signing to the Declaration of Independence in 1776, Franklin famously said, "We must hang together gentlemen . . . else we shall most assuredly hang separately." 

And while we come together to commemorate our independence from tyranny, this is also a day for embracing our fellow countrymen, for celebrating our interdependence. In that direction lies happiness.

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Courage is the result of practice. And that practice begins with risky play. In my 6-week course Teacher Tom's Risky Play, we will take a deep-dive into what means to trust children, to stand back, and explore what tools we need to keep children safe while also setting them free to authentically challenge themselves. This is where courage comes from. This course is about us as adults as much as the children. We will begin registration for the 2024 cohort for this course in the coming days. To learn more and to get on the waitlist, click here.

I put a lot of time and effort into this blog. If you'd like to support me please consider a small contribution to the cause. Thank you!

Inequality Aversion

We can all, under the right circumstances, behave selfishly, but laboratory studies consistently show that when faced with things like resource distribution, say sharing a cake, we demonstrate what scientists call "inequality aversion." Even children as young as three will divide a cake out equally, and at six would rather throw a slice away than allow one person, including themselves, to have more.

Indeed, it appears that we Homo sapiens, whatever else we are, are serious about equality. 

Over my decades in the classroom I've witnessed it myself, even amongst children younger than those studied. Sure, sometimes a kid can behave selfishly, but most of the time I find myself inspired by children's instinctive fairness in social situations. I once, in a misguided attempt to "teach" about fairness, tried to give all of the girls a special jewel, while excluding the boys. The moment the girls realized what was happening, they spontaneously handed their jewels back to me, rejecting them, saying, "It's not fair." They would only accept their jewels if I included the boys. There was nothing for me to teach these children about fairness.

Were I to ask strangers on the street, however, I'm certain that most would classify selfishness as one of the traits found under the heading of "childishness," along with a tendency toward tantrums and unreasonableness. We know what people mean when they say that someone is behaving "like a big baby." And those of us who work with children know that it's a slur against babies and young children in general.

The worst tantrums I've ever witnessed have been adults who have lost it. Unreasonable demands are far from the exclusive domain of children. And when it comes to selfishness, adults are far and away more likely to behave according to the own self interest even when it clearly harms or disadvantages someone else.

Selfishness is a learned behavior. We are born with a natural aversion to inequality. We are then socialized to want the biggest piece for ourselves, not through explicit teaching because most of us value fairness as a moral value, but because of the way the world is structured, with competition being one of the primary mechanism through which we distribute resources. A truly childish society would never allow billionaires to sit on their piles while millions of others are forced to live hand to mouth.

Many of us go out of our way as early childhood educators to teach equality, fairness, sharing, and turn taking, yet the research is quite clear: we are a species that already understands these things, at least in social situations. Perhaps the children should be our teachers. But we do it, I think, because we know the sad truth is that once the kids are in the world beyond our classroom walls, they will find themselves in an adult world in which selfishness often shows up as a virtue, even as few of us beyond the Ayn Rand inspired dead-enders believe it to be anything other than one of the roots of evil.

Still, research tells us that most of us, most of the time, also exhibit "inequality aversion." That finding, which has been replicated countless times, flies in the face of what many of us think we know about humans. We tend to think we live in a competitive dog-eat-dog world, but when we look to our left and look to our right we see fellow humans who are, in their hearts, unselfish and averse to inequality. Anthropologists tell us that this has been the norm for as long as there have been humans, that our species has thrived largely because of our instincts in favor of equality. So how did we get where we are?

I have my theories, but the bottom line is that our hunter-gatherer ancestors didn't tolerate selfishness in others. They would start by teasing and mocking someone who hoarded resources, for example, and if that didn't bring them into line, they would turn to shame and even, in extreme cases, ostracize them. I'm not advocating for shaming others, but I can honestly say that I feel ashamed of myself when I've behaved selfishly. I think most of us do. I don't know if those girls who returned the jewels to me were experiencing shame, but I imagine they would have had they kept the jewels. 

No, it seems to me that the only way that anyone can accept inequality is if they have bought into a story that frames inequality as inevitable or even righteous. In the past, that story might have been about the "divine" nature of the hoarder, which would excuse things like royal rule. Today, the story is that those with the most "deserve" it because they are smarter or have worked harder. These are modern mythologies, of course. We know for a fact that no one has the divine right to more. We know that hard work doesn't necessarily lead to more; if it did, most early childhood educators would be living large. And we all know smart people who have never been able to cash in on their brains, no matter how big. 

Perhaps, if we really value equality and fairness, we ought to be thinking more about the stories we tell, both to children and one another. But one story we can stop telling right now, is the myth of "childishness" because it implies that selfishness is our natural state, and that, according to both research and lived experience, is a pernicious myth.

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In my 6-week course Teacher Tom's Risky Play, we will take a deep-dive into what means to trust children, to stand back, and explore what tools we need to keep children safe while also setting them free to authentically challenge themselves. This course is about us as adults as much as the children. We will begin registration for the 2024 cohort for this course in the coming days. To learn more and to get on the waitlist, click here.

I put a lot of time and effort into this blog. If you'd like to support me please consider a small contribution to the cause. Thank you!

Freedom of Movement

When visiting Woodland Park for the first time, and especially our playground, many adults at first feel disoriented.  Not only are there dozens of children racing about, shouting, bickering, and laughing, but at first blush the space -- so unlike adult-oriented spaces like offices, museums, and libraries -- seems disorderly, even chaotic. Those who value a tidy, well-organized home, often find themselves at sea amidst the loose parts, art supplies, sensory materials, and a ground scattered with evidence of children at play.

As a cooperative preschool, the parents work in the classroom as assistant teachers. More than one parent opted to enroll their child elsewhere, not because they didn't have flexibility to spend a few hours a week with us, not because they didn't think their child would thrive, but because they didn't feel that they could handle the "mess." 

I get it. I tend to live tidily. I like my books organized alphabetically. I pick up my clothes, hang up my towels, keep up with the laundry, and stack my dishes neatly on their shelves. My own home, for me, is the opposite of disorienting -- it's literally orienting. Indeed, anyone who has lived in one place for any length of time, have homes that orient them. Knowing where to find things (e.g., keys in the bowl by the door), knowing where particular activities are best done (e.g., tooth brushing happens in the bathroom), and understanding how it all goes together (e.g., this light switch connects to that porch light) is part of the definition of home. Beyond that, our homes and other familiar places, are orienting in the sense that they have become extensions of our minds.

For instance, I keep a notepad on the kitchen counter. It's always in the same place. Each time I think of something we need, instead of relying on memory, I jot it down, delegating the responsibility for remembering to a shopping list. Over the weekend, we had a small dinner party. As part of buffing the place up for guests, my wife swept that pad of paper into a drawer. The following day when it wasn't where I expected to find it, I was disoriented, so much so that the first time I looked in the drawer I couldn't see that pad of paper. I had briefly, and literally, lost my mind, or at least that part of it.

But it goes beyond that. We also externalize our minds into all kinds of familiar spaces, storing ideas, emotions, and memories in every nook and cranny. That book evokes a conversation I had with my father-in-law. This coffee mug takes me back to a golden sunrise. The stain in the carpet, the dent in the trash can, the sound of a squeaky hinge are all landmarks on both the physical and mental maps of my home. In many ways, this is what learning is: connecting our minds to our mental map of the world.

Our ancient ancestors evolved the capacity to find their way around. Knowing where to find food and shelter, remembering where the predators lurked, recalling hazards, and being able to return to places of inspiration were absolutely essential to survival. In the modern world, we use our built-in navigational system not only for getting around in the physical world, but also for comprehending the metaphorical "landscape" of abstract ideas and emotions.

"This repurposing of our sense of physical place to navigate through purely mental structures is reflected in the language we use every day," writes science journalist Annie Murphy Paul in her book The Extended Mind. "(W)e say the future lies "up ahead," while the past is "behind" us; we endeavor to stay "on top of things" and not to get "out of our depth"; we "reach" for a lofty goal or "stoop" low to commit a disreputable act. These are not merely figures of speech but revealing evidence of how we habitually understand and interact with the world around us."

As adults, we've created a universe of mental maps and typically it only takes a couple weeks for new parents to orient themselves in our classroom and on our playground. They begin to understand the lay of the land, where things are, and how it goes together. Their minds become integrated with the environment, which makes it less disorienting even as the space itself remains the same. It's a natural process, one we've all gone through countless times, moving from disorientation to orientation.

This, of course, is what happens with the children as well, although they don't have the experience their parents have, which is why they must be free to move their bodies. From the moment they walk into our classrooms or onto our playgrounds, they begin the human process of creating mental maps and that requires them to move their bodies around the space. There's a lot of intimidating talk these days about thinking machines, about how they are, or will soon be, so much "smarter" than us, their creators. And it's true that machines are much more capable of handling massive amounts of abstract information than are individual humans. Our brains aren't well-equipped for "thinking" about mountains of mind-numbing minutia, let alone at the rate of millions of calculations per second. No, our brains have evolved to be distracted, to be on the go, to be constantly creating relationships with the people, places, and things we encounter and using them as intellectual and emotional landmarks in which to store details for future reference. This is what children are learning to do when we allow them to move.

There was a time, not so long ago, when we understood that young children needed to move and move a lot, but unfortunately and increasingly, we are subjecting them to the school-ish practice of sitting still to process abstract information and it's harming them. What their brains need, what their bodies need, is to move in order to find their way around and remember where they've been. If we're serious about learning, we must allow our youngest citizens to move. By freeing children to exercise their brain's navigational system in physical space we allow them to prepare for future mental maps of landscapes comprised of abstract concepts and ideas. 

Indeed, in many ways, this is what learning is: the process of moving from disorientation to orientation. And the foundation of that process is the freedom to move.

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One of the things we lose when we prevent children from moving is the natural and healthy risk-taking that goes with it. In my 6-week course Teacher Tom's Risky Play, we will take a deep-dive into what means to trust children, to stand back, and explore what tools we need to keep children safe while also setting them free to be the "emissaries" the world needs. This course is about us as adults as much as the children. We will begin registration for the 2024 cohort for this course in the coming days. To learn more and to get on the waitlist, click here.

I put a lot of time and effort into this blog. If you'd like to support me please consider a small contribution to the cause. Thank you!

"I'm Anna!" "No, I'm Anna!"

"I'm Anna!"

"No, I'm Anna!"

It wasn't the first time that children argued over who was Anna or Elsa or Batman or one of the Paw Patrol characters. Their bodies were rigid beneath the thin fabric of their princess dresses, the faces red and fierce. The other children stood around them, their game at an impasse as the girls stood toe-to-toe.

"There's only one Anna!" one of them shouted, putting a fine point on the obvious. They all knew the story. Some of them had always known the story, having watched it unfold again and again on their screens for as long as their parents had allowed them to view screens. There is only one Anna, yet here we were with two.

Or rather, from where I stood outside the story, there were no Annas, just two children staking a claim to a role in a game of pretend. Neither of them was really Anna. I could see that. The children who encircled them could see it. 

"(W)e think we tell stories," writes Rebecca Solnit in her book The Faraway Nearby, "but often the stories tell us."

Up to this point, the story had been largely telling the girls as they followed the familiar script, but now, with the advent of two Annas, the story had taken an impossible turn. As the children stood in that moment, balanced between the familiar and unfamiliar, known and unknown, everything was up in the air. It would have been easy to step in with my adult-ish stories about getting along and taking turns and sharing, but that would have been missing the point. 

We have all faced these moments when our stories stop telling us, when people or events, make the familiar impossible. This, I think, was at least in part what philosopher Blaise Pascal was getting at when the wrote, "All of humanity's problems stem from man's inability to sit quietly in a room alone." If we could, we would simply allow our stories to tell us, but the moment we step out into the world, the moment our scripts must be merged with those of our fellow humans, we must figure out how to tell our story with two Annas or three or, we come to realize, Annas that go all the way down.

Everything we think we know is part of the story we tell about the world. Movies like Frozen in many ways stand-in for the mythologies that always underpin our understanding of ourselves and our place in the world. What makes these modern stories different from those ancient stories is that the telling as been fixed by the nature of movie-making, suggesting that the story is forever and unalterable. For most of human existence, however, before the phonetic alphabet made it possible to create this illusion, our oral tradition meant that every story was either told and retold or forgotten, and each time it happened, invariably, the story changed depending upon the teller and the circumstances. Every telling of every story was an act of creation in which we tell the story while the story tells us.

"I'm Anna!"

"No, I'm Anna!"

"I know! We can both be Anna!"

The old truth had been made into a new truth: two Annas miraculously born from one. It was at once both new and as old as any story ever told; as new and as old as any story that has ever told us.

It took a moment for the children to absorb this amazing new thing that had been created, but not for long, because in the world outside our rooms, the stories can't be paused or bookmarked. They go on telling us and we go on telling them in a never-ending process of creating two Annas from one.

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If you liked reading this post, you might also enjoy one of my books. To find out more, Click here! "Few people are better qualified to support people working in the field of early childhood education than Teacher Tom. This is a book you will want to keep close to your soul." ~Daniel Hodgins, author of Boys: Changing the Classroom, Not the Child, and Get Over It! Relearning Guidance Practices

I put a lot of time and effort into this blog. If you'd like to support me please consider a small contribution to the cause. Thank you!